Uncomfortable
by Velvet mace
Summary: An unlikely excuse to get Ed to wear his brother. Now with an Epilogue.
1. Default Chapter

Disclaimer: Do I really need one? Honestly, like someone would think I owned any of these characters.

UNCOMFORTABLE

"Um. Here. My report," said Ed, handing Hawkeye a manila folder. "And this." He handed a small leather book. Hawkeye raised an eyebrow at the unusually nervous 15 year old. "That should be everything. Tell Mustang I'm off to, um, check on a lead. Bye."

And he turned with a swish of his red coat and was half way out the door before Hawkeye could call out. "Hold on, there!"

But Ed was gone. Hawkeye sighed and gathered the report and book up to put on Mustangs desk.

Fifteen minutes later Mustang called out from his office "I want to see Fullmetal as soon as possible!"

Hawkeye sighed. Should have seen that coming.

oooooooo

Ed entered their dorm room and closed the door firmly behind him. "We gotta get out of town now."

"What do you want to do with this?" Al said holding up a belly dancers costume, all filmy scarves and sequins.

"I don't know. I better destroy it."

"But it isn't ours… you stole it. It looks expensive. Shouldn't we give it back?"

Damn Al for having a conscious. "Ok, toss it in the suitcase, we'll mail it back from Winry's." Ed scrambled to organize his notes and find the various small personal things he'd need.

There was a knock at their door. Ed froze his eyes open wide.

"Let me in, young Elric," came a loud reverberant voice. "Colonel Mustang has asked me to escort you to his office, to follow up on your report."

"Tell him I'm not here," whispered Ed.

"Uh. Brother isn't here right now!" Al called through the door. "He's um… in the bathroom."

"Ah, thank you."

"In the bathroom?" said Ed. That will take Armstrong all of 30 seconds to check. "Why didn't you say the mess? Or the library." Ed ran to the window and looked down. It was bright daylight, and the quad was swarming with uniforms.

"Sorry, brother."

"Never mind. You gotta hide me."

"How?"

ooooooooo

Armstrong returned to the door in 30 seconds. He paused, hearing an odd clattering behind the door. "Alphonse Elric, Open the door. Now." He mustered his presence and sent it out like a shimmering wave, confident that the younger brother would crumble to his will.

"Uh…" came the young voice. "Uh, just a moment. I'm coming."

Al opened the door. He seemed curiously stooped and humbled. Armstrong felt a moment of regret. He really shouldn't over use his commanding aura. It had an unfortunate tendency to terrify those around him.

Armstrong walked in and called out, "Come out Edward, I know you are in here. Others have seen you come in here. There is no point in hiding." No answer. Armstrong checked under the neatly made beds. Nothing but dust. "There is nothing to fear, " Armstrong continued. "I'm sure whatever you have done, it will be better just to own it and get it over with."

Al hiccupped.

Armstrong checked the closet. Empty. Hmmm.

"Uh, maybe he went to the mess… or the library," Al suggested.

Armstrong frowned. "Very well, should he return, please send him to Colonel."

oooooooooo

Al closed the door, and heard a voice from his neck. "That was close."

It was odd feeling his brother inside him. Disconcerting, and kind of heavy. And Ed had a tendency to tense up when he moved make it difficult to keep his balance. "Maybe you should just go and check in," Al suggested.

"Hell no, Al. It was embarrassing enough to sneaking into a brothel after that book. Having to admit I dressed up like an, um, entertainer to search the place was worse. Seeing all those naked women.., doing… uh… things… I KNOW he's going to make me describe the experience in excruciating detail, the pervert. Honestly my report should be enough."

"Ok. But now what do we do?"

"Can you get me to the train station?"

"With you inside me?"

"Yeah! Otherwise I'll be seen."

"Ok, but you have to relax, brother. Let me do the walking. Otherwise I'm going to fall down."

oooooooooooo

Al was surprisingly uncomfortable to wear. He was just too damn tall. When Al took over and stood up fully, Ed's feet lifted up off the ground and dangled midway up the metal shins.

Unfortunately that meant that Ed's weight was almost exclusively carried on a rather narrow band of armor running between his legs. The armored arms were also a bit too high, and meant his arms were held in a rather uncomfortable position. Ed finally resorted to pulling his arms back out and holding onto the inside of the armholes to relieve the pressure on his more sensitive areas.

And then there was the suitcase stuffed between his chest and Als chestplate. Never had it felt quite so hard and full of corners. And Al's tiny eye holes… it was darned hard to see ANYTHING through them.

Letting Al carry him around was almost unendurable. However when Al relaxed and let Ed take over, they were forced to walk in an uncharacteristically stooped and awkward manner and attracted a lot more attention than Ed felt comfortable with.

In the end they compromised, with bumbling stooped shuffles and occasional sprints accompanied by a whispered "ow, ow, ow, ow, ow." Somehow they made it to the train station without being waylaid.

But that was as far as they got.

"Duck into the men's room, Al, I need to get out." Ed wondered if he could even walk straight at this point.

"We'll get caught… Oh no, there's the Coronel."

Ed levered himself up enough to see out the narrow eye holes. Sure enough there was Mustang looking smug sitting on a train bench, glancing through the contents of a manila folder. His report. Dang.

Ed made Al turn his head. There was Armstrong on one end of the platform and several other uniformed officers milling about near the ticket counter. "He anticipated me, the bastard."

"Ok, change of plans. I can live like this long enough to get on the train. Tell him that I sent you to Winry's and that I was going to, um, someplace to check something out. I'll be back in three weeks."

"Ok, brother. But I better walk."

"Ouch."

oooooooooo

The train pulled up. Al did his best to quietly board but was caught before he'd covered half the distance between their hiding spot and the open door.

"Well, Al. Where's your brother." Mustang asked holding his arm.

"I don't know, sir. He sent me on ahead."

"Oh, so he's going to Rizenbul too?

"Uh, no, he's going somewhere else, to do, uh research, for a couple of weeks."

"Mmm, I see," Mustang drawled. "And where exactly was this somewhere else."

"He didn't say. Sir, the train is about to leave."

"Really, is it now? That's ok, Al, you can catch the next one."

Al nervousness hit a new high. He hated having to assert himself like this, "I'm not under your command, sir. You can't stop me."

"Very true. But Fullmetal is, and as long as he's hiding inside you, I really can't let you leave." Mustang quietly gestured to his men.

Al heard a choking noise coming from his neck, and sighed as he was surrounded.

oooooooooo

Ed looked really uncomfortable in the car for the ride back to his office. Mustang liked that. He wasn't sure which amused him more, the fact that Ed could barely sit straight without wincing, or the fact that he apparently still had his disguise in his suitcase.

"Would you like me to send Armstrong out for some ice when we arrive?"

"You are a bastard."

"And you were dangerously close to going AWOL. And over this, really." Mustang lifted out the costume and shook it slightly. It jingled.

Ed grunted, shifted, and looked miserable.

"And that report was not nearly as thorough as it should have been. I think you'll have to flesh it out quite a bit."

Ed groaned.

"That was really inconvenient forcing me to leave the office. I had a lot of work to do. Mmm. I think just for that I'll have you demonstrate."

Ed's eyes widened. "Demonstrate what?"

Roy ran his hands through the gauzy material, holding it up to the light. "Demonstrate how the hell you managed to hide your automail when you wore this thing. It boggles the mind."

It took a lot of self-control not to laugh the entire way back.

The End.

A/N Really want to know how Ed hid the automail? And why he had to wear the get up in the first place? And why he STILL had the outfit back at the dorms? I know. It makes sense but is somewhat humiliating… and honestly do you want to put him through that? Hasn't the poor boy been spanked enough?


	2. Epilogue

A/N: Bumping this up to PG for poorly described nudity and mild sexual innuendo.

And let the spanking begin….

EPILOGUE

"I used pantyhose," said Ed.

"Panty hose," Roy drawled slowly, drawing out each syllable.

"Yeah, you know what they are. There was a bunch of hose in various colors in where they stored the costume. I wore one pair, and I found one that was close to the color of my skin but opaque for my arm."

"How on earth did you keep them on?"

"The legs were easy enough, I used a garter belt, but I had to make some modifications of the one I used for my arm. I ended up slitting it half way so it would cover my shoulder, cutting finger holes and tying it around my chest, under the bodice."

"And you are telling me they couldn't tell you were wearing pantyhose on your arm."

"It was very late, most of the patrons I saw were very drunk, and the light was pretty dim. And honestly I tried not to let anyone get that close a look. Now can I change back? I'm starting to feel chilly."

"I imagine that's the ice pack. What about your hand, you said you made finger holes."

"I wore long gloves."

"Why weren't the gloves and the hose in your suitcase, or for that matter why WAS the dress in there?"

"You aren't going to make this easy on me, are you, sir."

"I'm going to be here until 8 pm making up for the work I didn't do when I was chasing you down today. So the answer is, no. I'm not going to make this easy on you." Roy leaned forward on his desk, laced his fingers under his chin and smiled. "So why don't you start from the point you tried to get in the brothel."

oooooooo

Stealth was not really their strong suit. Or spying for that matter, but neither was giving up, and with enough questions and guess work the Elric brothers had traced down their likely thief to seedy but legal red light district of Central City.

When their quarry entered the brothel, Ed and Al had followed almost without noticing what sort of establishment it was. Ed's eyes were immediately assaulted and not just the heavy cigar smoke. The double brass doors opened in on a spacious lounge gaudily decked out in red velvet, and punctuated rather conspicuously with women. Women wearing very close to nothing at all.

Ed flushed and took an involuntary step back against his brother.

"Uh, brother…" said Al.

Ed recovered his composure. "It's ok. In fact it's better than ok. He'll be distracted and we can just steal that damn book back off of him and get back in time for a good nights sleep. We just won't LOOK too hard."

A hand hit Edward's shoulder and sent him through the roof. He looked up, and up, and up at a man who might take on Armstrong in an arm wrestling match. "No minors, kid."

"Who you calling a kid!" Ed drew himself up to his fullest possible height.

"What are you, kid, twelve?"

Ed flushed again but for entirely different reasons, "I'm FIFTEEN."

The hulk let out a guffaw. "Uh huh. See you in three years, kid." And escorted the two of them firmly out of the building.

oooooooo

Outside they reconsidered. "It's still the best place to get it back, " whispered Ed. "Maybe you'd have better luck. You look older."

Al's voice was slightly squeaky. "Uh… if you say so."

Al returned less than a minute later. "They thought my voice was too high and wanted me to take off my helmet."

Ed rubbed his forehead, "Well damn, that's that for the direct approach."

"Are we going to wait for him to come out?"

"What a waste of time, he could be there all night. Look up there, Al, see what I'm seeing?"

Al followed his arm. "Second story windows."

"Lets go around the back, you can boost me up. Once we I get past the goon at the door, it should be smooth sailing."

ooooooo

"But it wasn't," said Roy.

"No. There was more than one goon."

"So you decided to disguise yourself."

"Well, not right away," admitted Ed. "At first I thought I could just sneak around up on the second floor."

"But you got caught."

"Yeah."

"And they threw you out."

"Yeah."

"Didn't your mark notice all the commotion?"

"Apparently underage boys sneaking into a whorehouse isn't considered ground shaking news."

oooooooooo

Al hoisted him back up through the window. This time Ed stopped before wandering out the door of the dressing room. He opened the door a fraction of an inch and observed. Three goons wandered up and down between the second floor balcony and the grand lounge before. Their eyes, Ed noticed, were firmly on the patrons. Women, some semi naked, and others in fanciful costumes wandered around freely without the goons even turning their heads.

He saw the thief again a woman on each arm walk through a door down the hall. Then one of the goons paced the mezzanine again.

Ed closed the door quickly and quietly and surveyed his surroundings. There was rack upon rack of costumes, most of which were skimpy and rather alarmingly full of feathers. Gritting his teeth Ed pushed forward and started rummaging.

oooooooooooo

"And THAT'S when you put on the dress."

"I picked the one that covered the most."

"What did you do with your clothes?"

"Well, I considered hiding them in the room, but then I realized I'd have to come back to get them again. And honestly I didn't want to be wearing a dress longer than I had to. It seemed to make more sense to throw them down to Al and have him hold onto them. I figured I could climb out the window of this guy's room and change back in the alley way."

"But it didn't work out that way," said Roy smirking. "You got caught. Again."

"Yeah."

oooooooo

The door to the dressing room opened abruptly while Ed was still struggling to fasten the bodice behind his back. He froze in place and looked straight at nearly naked woman in her mid twenties. Her eyes were wide and her hand reached up and covered her mouth.

"Don't scream," Ed half begged.

She started laughing. "Boy you are willing to go a long way to look at naked women. That takes some balls."

Balls were precisely what Ed was feeling acutely deficient in at the moment.

"So what's with the get up? Are you a perv or just really hard up?"

"It's a … " Ed thought fast, "Hazing."

She seemed to get it immediately.

"So…" said Ed hesitantly. "Are you going to rat me out?"

"Mmmm…" she tapped a finger against her lips.

ooooooooo

"What did she look like," asked Roy.

"What do you mean?"

"You keep saying that all these women were semi-nude, but that's really not a very good picture. What was she wearing? Was she cute?"

"Uh, I fail to see how this is important."

"Yes, but I'm the one in charge, it's up to me to decide what details are important and which ones aren't."

Ed rolled his eyes and sighed. "Yeah, I suppose she was good looking. She had long brown hair and a lot of make up and, " Ed reddened. "She was wearing tassels on her, um, you know. Don't ask me how they stayed on, because I don't know. Red tassels. And panties shaped like a … you know… heart." Ed hid his face in his hands.

"Was she a B cup or a C?"

"A what or a what?" Ed looked truly perplexed. "She didn't have any cups. Or letters."

"Never mind." Roy sighed. "In any case she thought YOU were cute."

"Yeah, apparently." Ed was really red now.

"And she made you pay for her help."

"Not with money, but yeah."

ooooooo

Her name was Mary, and apparently she had a long-standing desire to dress up men like dolls. Since Ed had already gone half way there on his own, and he was pretty much at her mercy as far as maintaining a low profile, he sighed and let her do her thing.

Her thing was to sit him down at one of three dressing tables and put make up on him and play with his hair. All while she was doing this, she cooed over him telling him how pretty his hair was, and how sweet his eyes were, and how adorable his figure, and lovely his lips. Ed gripped the sides of the chair and clenched his teeth and endured.

The only up side was that she never called him short. It was a very small blessing.

Ed wondered how Al was doing. This whole infiltration was taking rather a lot longer than Ed had anticipated. He hoped that Al wasn't getting too bored or worried.

She'd fussed over his hair for a good fifteen minutes before he felt he had to put an end to it. "I don't think you can make it any more 'up'," he said. "I really got to do what I, um, pledged I would."

"And what is that, sweetie," Mary asked smearing a bit of oil on a lock of hair by his ear and then curling it around her finger.

"I got to get back a book. Listen, I know what room it's in."

"You want to steal someone's book?"

"Actually, he's the one who stole it, I'm merely getting it back. And anyway, someone could walk in on us at any minute."

Mary giggled. "Well, ok. Stand up lets look at you." She looked him over with a very critical eye. "The hose is a cute idea, but I wouldn't draw attention to your arm. Or your legs. Speaking of which, that really looks odd."

"The hose?" Ed looked down.

"No, silly the shorts. I can see them through the material."

"No you can't!"

"Yes I can. There's an outline of white boxers. Trust me, if anyone's going to look at you, that's where their eyes are going. Well, one of the places. They'll have to go."

"I can't go around without shorts on!"

"I don't see why not, nothing we all haven't seen before." Mary giggled.

"I don't look like a girl that's why."

In the end he let her choose out a pair of panties that were rather spacious in the front, but sadly lacking in the rear.

oooooooo

"Those weren't in the suitcase either," noted Roy.

"Thank GOD!"

"You know, you CAN see your shorts through that dress."

There was a rather heavy pause. Then Roy continued: "So did you throw the shorts down to Al as well?"

"No. Apparently while Mary was playing dress up with me, one of the Goons had gone around the building and saw Al. When I looked out the window he was gone."

"With your clothes."

"Yes."

"So what did you do with your shorts?"

"I stuffed the bodice with them."

ooooooo

"And now we need to give you a reason to hide your arm." Mary went to a large dresser and opened it. Inside were large white fluffy towels. "You are in luck," she said, "The door you said he walked through leads to the baths."

"The baths."

"Uh huh. Here, I'll go with you, that way you will stand out even less."

"Thanks. I owe you."

"No you don't. You'd have to beat me off with a stick not to watch you do this. Now one last thing."

She took out what looked like paint but turned out to be glue and a number of small rhinestones from a small drawer in one of the dressing table.

"Oh, hell, don't you think you've dressed me up enough already?" Ed complained.

"You need a focal point. Something to draw the eyes away from your legs." She carefully glued the stones in a circle around his navel. "It goes with the belly dancer shtick. Besides you've got the cutest belly button. Ooh, almost an outie."

ooooooo

"So did you make it without being noticed?"

"Not… exactly. The goons didn't notice me."

"But the patrons did."

"One of them. Uh, yeah."

ooooooooo

They made it down the hall and through the door without incident. Ed carried a towel over his shoulder and a couple more in front of his somewhat lumpy cleavage. Mary did the same. "They always need more towels in the baths, " she chattered.

The baths were a series of private rooms off a tiled hall. The lighting was rather better in this portion of the building and Ed was feeling a bit more conspicuous. "Do you know which room he is in?"

"No."

"Well, we'll just need to check each one. Just duck your head in, put down a towel in the corner, check out whose there, and if you see the right one, well, you know what to do." Mary was taking this whole thing very lightly, as if this were some play being put on for her entertainment.

Since there was really no helping it, he did what she told him. He opened the first door glanced just long enough to… see rather too much of what goes on in a bathroom in a whore house. The patrons were rather distracted, and gave him only the briefest of glances as he dropped a towel on a small table and ducked back out again.

oooooooo

"What were they up to?"

"I'm too young to know, " said Ed pointedly.

"Very well, go on. A patron caught you."

"Caught is too strong a word. I was reaching out for the next door when the patron opened it up and almost walked into me. I backed up out of his way and turned around but he…"

"He what?"

"Pinched me."

"Where?"

"On my butt, as he passed. I don't think he gave more than half a glance though."

"Probably not."

ooooooooo

Mary thought it was the funniest thing ever. "You really shouldn't blush too much, " she cautioned after a moment. "Whores are pretty used to that sort of thing."

"I'm not trying to blush, " Ed said.

Once his face had cooled enough he tried the next door. Bingo. There was the thief in an oversized clawfoot tub, one of the whores was standing outside the tub washing his foot, the other was inside the tub feeding him grapes.

Ed averted his eyes. There was the man's clothes. Ed put down the towels next to the hastily tossed clothes and quickly patted the pockets. He found the book, and walked out the door before the thief even acknowledged his presence.

oooooooo

"I then went out the nearest window, just like I said I would. And I got rid of the panties, gloves and the garter belt and the hose. The hose was pretty well ruined."

"Where was Al and your clothes?"

"Back at the dorms."

"I see."

"They chased him for several blocks, and then he figured that it wasn't safe for him to come back. I think he forgot he had my clothes. He'd put them inside his armor. Anyway, he says he forgot."

"So you wore the dress back."

"I didn't mean to but…"

ooooooo

Ed was just starting to unhook the bodice when the first drops of rain began to fall out of the sky. He looked up miserably. Then looked at the book. "I think someone hates me, " he said to no one.

He ran to search the nearest garbage for something to keep the rain off the book. The best that he could find was a small cardboard box. He stuffed the book into it.

By then it was really raining. The ridiculous belly dancer outfit was sticking to his skin, his hair was sliding out of it's pins, and then he realized the worst of it. His shorts were wet. And clingy. And white, shading to see through.

"Someone really, really hates me."

While the belly dancers costume wasn't ideal for walking through the military campus on a warm wet summer night, it was better than the alternative.

ooooooo

"There, can I take this off now? Or are you going to make me walk back to the dorms like this."

Roy grinned. "Tempting, but I think it's time to switch back to normal clothes. I think you've been punished enough for one afternoon."

Ed quickly reached up and unhooked the bodice and shimmied out of the dress.

"Besides if you walked out of here, wearing that and walking the way you are now, people might come to entirely the wrong conclusion about what we were doing in here. I don't feel the need to be punished for your bad decisions."

Ed paused while buttoning his shirt to give Roy a weird look. "What does the way I walk have to do with anything?"

Roy covered his grin. "Never mind, never mind."

"You are sick, " said Ed and walked stiffly out of his office.

THE END… really.


End file.
